


Come Back To Me (I Need You)

by TsingaDark



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Minor Character Death(s), M/M, Reunion, Violence, Zombie Apocalypse, it's not actually that graphic but it's still a zombie apocalypse so, kind of?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-02
Updated: 2016-09-02
Packaged: 2018-08-12 14:54:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7938802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TsingaDark/pseuds/TsingaDark
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dan and Phil got separated when the zombie apocalypse broke out. It's been weeks since then and Phil still won't give up hope of finding Dan.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Come Back To Me (I Need You)

**Author's Note:**

> When I had the idea for this fic, I wanted it to be funny, short and fluffy. Obviously, it turned out to be neither of those... I mean, I guess there's a bit of fluff but it's way more angst-y than I intended.
> 
> (also, instead of writing this I should've been working on my pbb fic. why am I like this)

Phil had survived roughly a hundred days of The Real Apocalypse. He called it that because this wasn’t a movie or a TV show or even a prank for his YouTube channel. No, this was actually real.

To be honest, he wasn’t sure how he’d made it this long. He was a shitty shooter and even worse in actual hand to hand combat. His survival was probably down to a group that had kindly taken him in despite his obvious inability at fighting.

Back in the beginning, when he’d still been alone, he’d stumbled upon them by accident. Well, more accurately, he’d stumbled over one of their alarm systems they’d put into place. He’d been lucky enough they didn’t immediately shoot him.

They’d taken him in and at first it’d seemed like a lifeline because these people were strong and they knew how to fight, but over the weeks their numbers decimated until the once twenty-five people strong group only consisted of ten.

Phil didn’t know how he was still here when other people who’d been more capable in every sense than Phil were gone. He tried not to think about that, though, and just go on and live his life. Or what was left of it at least.

He was in good company and sometimes, albeit it happening very rarely, he forgot about what was happening outside. Sometimes he forgot about the zombie hordes that were searching for fresh meat, who wouldn’t hesitate to eat Phil alive.

Even during those rare times where everything felt kind of normal, he still felt alone. He knew he’d never stop feeling that way until he found Dan.

Dan and him had got separated right at the beginning. When the apocalypse had broken out, they’d been in the city centre and Phil remembered vividly how he’d looked away for just a second and when he’d turned around again, Dan had been gone.

It was funny in a way because they’d joked about Phil getting lost before. He’d been lost at a mall, for fuck’s sake, and one time Dan actually had to get the reception at a tube station to make an announcement.

This was, of course, nothing like that. They hadn’t been able to call each other as the network had caved in and Phil hadn’t been able to go back to their flat. He’d hidden in a random house where he’d stayed for quite a long time. He didn’t even know how long it’d been but when he emerged the streets had been almost empty, except for the bodies that lined the curbs.

Phil shook his head to get rid of the images of blood and ripped out intestines in his mind. He didn’t dare think about Dan having the same fate.

Dan mightn’t have been the best fighter, much like Phil, and he mightn’t have been the fittest but Phil knew that Dan wouldn’t have given up easily. He was sure that they shared the ever present desire of finding the other.

Phil was pulled out of his thoughts as the smell of rotten flesh hit his senses. He grimaced and motioned to Claire that something was amiss. She nodded and put one foot in front of the other even more carefully than before.

They were out on a food run that they regularly did once a week so as not to accidentally run out of food. This time it had been their turn again. Phil usually did patrols and the like with Claire because they were a good team. Before the apocalypse she’d been doing martial arts in her spare time so she was the best addition to Phil’s non-existent fighting skills.

They came to the end of an alley and Claire went ahead and looked around the corner. She turned to Phil after a few seconds and motioned that they could go on.

Food runs went smoothly most of the time as not a lot of zombies were left in this area. Phil had only encountered two on these runs and one of them hadn’t been able to run anymore as he didn’t have any legs, so Phil didn’t exactly worry about the smell they’d noticed. It was probably coming from a dead body anyway and not from a zombie. This was just like any other day in the apocalypse, stumbling upon mutilated bodies and ignoring them because it didn’t do any good dwelling on who those people had once been.  

Except, when they rounded the corner, suddenly a zombie appeared from behind one of the cars that lined the street. And it was a fast one.

It came running towards them as soon as it’d spotted them, all the while uttering a screeching sound that made Phil want to press his hands onto his ears. Instead, he raised the baseball bat he took with him everywhere, ready - at least as ready as he was ever going to be - for the zombie.

It got to Claire first and she swung her axe, missing it by a few centimetres. Phil was about to run towards the two when he picked up on another sound. As he swivelled around he saw a second zombie coming out of a different alleyway, probably because it had heard its colleague.

Phil swore - a bad habit he’d picked up during the apocalypse - and steeled himself for the oncoming. He knew he needed to hit the zombie right away, otherwise it wouldn’t end very well for him.

Of course, he didn’t hit the zombie on the first try. He managed to stumble out of the way in time though and hit the zombie’s shoulder on the second swing. This momentarily confused the zombie and Phil was able to hit its head as hard as he could.

As the zombie crumbled to the ground Phil looked up to see Claire still fighting. The unnerving thing though, was that it wasn’t the initial zombie that had attacked her as that one was lying dead on the street next to her. Phil almost tripped over the body of his zombie when he tried to get to Claire and therefore had nearly missed the three zombies running straight towards them.

Claire noticed them immediately and while pulling her axe out of the zombies head, shouted one single word: _Run!_

Phil turned around and started running as fast as he could. They had emergency routes for these kinds of things and at first he’d thought it silly but now he was really glad he knew every single one of them by heart. They couldn’t have gone back the way they’d come from. There were too many streets where they would’ve had to climb over things and the zombies would surely have got them straight away.

Phil turned into an alleyway and tried to pick up speed as he heard the screams of the zombies getting nearer. Despite having been behind him at the beginning, Claire was now in front of him and Phil knew he shouldn’t be thinking about things like that when he was about to die, but he was wondering how in hell she was able to run that fast with her short legs.

Maybe it had been that one short moment of inattention or maybe it was purely bad luck but either way, Phil tripped and fell onto the hard, unrelenting concrete, tearing the skin on his hands in the process. As soon as he realised what had happened he scrambled to get up but something gripped his ankle and he was pulled backwards.

Someone was shouting his name as he tried to reach his baseball bat that he’d dropped during the fall but it was too far away for him to reach and he knew that this was it. This was the one mistake that would get him killed.

Suddenly a loud bang resonated through the air, startling Phil with its closeness. Then another one and another one.

The screams were gone. The screeching sounds were gone. Silence permeated the alleyway and Phil was almost afraid to breathe, lest he disturb it. Then someone pulled at his arm.

“Get up,” a voice said to his left, “there might be more coming.”

He was pulled to his feet by some guy and then Claire was at his side.

“Oh my God, Phil!” she exclaimed, genuine worry in her voice. “Are you okay?”

“I’m…,” Phil said, trailing off as he looked down at himself, specifically at his leg. There was no sign of a bite. “I think so.”

“Phil?” the guy whispered. He sounded familiar in a way and Phil lifted his gaze to properly look at him. What he saw made his breath catch.

His hair was shorter and the bags under his eyes were more prominent than ever but it was unmistakably him.

“Dan,” Phil breathed and before he knew what he was doing, he’d stepped forward into Dan’s arms and they were hugging.

Phil couldn’t stop the tears forming in his eyes as Dan repeated his name over and over again and they probably would’ve remained in that exact position for hours if Claire hadn’t shook Phil’s shoulder.

“As nice as this is,” she said apologetic, “there are probably more zombies coming and we need to get out of here. You can hug all you want when we’re safe.”

“Of course,” Dan replied and stepped away from Phil. He seemed infinitely better composed than Phil but as they carefully started jogging towards the end of the alley, he took Phil’s hand in his and Phil could feel him shaking badly.

*

They arrived at the group’s safe place ten minutes later, having successfully avoided any other zombies. The whole journey over Phil hadn’t been able to believe that he’d actually found Dan. His gaze kept straying over to him and their intertwined hands and he couldn’t stop himself from squeezing Dan’s hand every few minutes just to make sure that he was actually there.

He’d pictured so many different reunions in his mind but strangely enough it had never been like this. At times, when Phil had lain in his bed late at night, his mind had whispered traitorous thoughts about Dan having died long ago, but he’d never allowed the images of Dan’s cold body to take permanent residence because he knew, he just _knew_ , he’d find him one day. As it turned out, Dan had found him, but in the end it didn’t make a difference. The important part was that they were together once more.

As they stepped into the main room of the house they occupied, everyone stared at them, which wasn’t exactly unexpected. They came back empty-handed and with another person, after all.

Claire quickly explained what had happened and soon enough they were herded into the bathroom to make sure that none of them had got bitten.

For some strange reason Phil felt uneasy undressing in front of Dan, which was silly, of course, because Dan had seen him naked plenty of times. In a way though, this was them getting to know each other all over again. Even if they hadn’t actually been apart for that long, it had been a stressful time, and with or without each other they had changed. At least Phil noticed the ways he had changed during the last few weeks. Apocalypses did that, he supposed.

Dan seemed to feel the same as Phil because when he checked Phil for bites, his fingers were careful, almost not even touching Phil’s skin. It made Phil’s stomach drop but at the same time he could understand. Even if they weren’t checking for bites, the situation would probably not be very different. Since Phil lived in a group, food was evenly distributed between them, which meant that sometimes the portions weren’t very big. Phil hadn’t weighed a lot to begin with but since the apocalypse he’d lost a considerable amount of weight, causing his ribs to show. He must look fragile to Dan’s eyes.

Dan looked to have lost weight as well but somehow not as much as Phil. He must’ve managed to regularly get a decent amount of food. Had he been alone all this time?

They didn’t talk during their checks, apart from the word ‘clear’ that was uttered from them at the end. It was a relief that no one had to die. It always was.

When they went back into the main room, everyone was more relaxed than before but they still stared. This time mainly at Dan, who seemed to stick out like a sore thumb.

Phil decided to speak up and introduce Dan so that they could seek out a quiet spot and talk without having anyone else listen in.

“This is my…” _best friend, boyfriend, soulmate_ , Phil’s mind unhelpfully provided. “This is Dan,” he eventually settled on. Everyone had heard him utter his name anyway at some point or the other.

Gary, the oldest of the group but in no way the leader, came forward and clasped Phil’s shoulder. “I’m glad you found him,” he said and smiled at both of them, his eyes remaining sad despite his words. He had, like everyone else too, lost someone in the past.

Phil smiled back and automatically reached for Dan’s hand. “Thank you,” he said sincerely and suddenly it was like a dam had broken as everyone stepped towards Phil and congratulated him. It was so surreal how everyone patted his shoulder or his back and Felix even hugged Phil and then Dan, who squeaked in surprise.

Phil felt so incredibly happy in that moment, with these people that had become family of some sort for him and the one person by his side he needed more than anyone else in his life. He shuffled closer to Dan, who immediately put his arm around his waist, pulling him even closer. It felt right to be in his arms again, like nothing had these last few weeks.

After everyone had gone back to their places Phil excused him and Dan and immediately pulled Dan with him into a corridor. They had occupied a small hotel that unnervingly reminded Phil of _The Shining_. Sometimes when he walked the empty corridors of the building, he expected a zombie to jump out at him from a corner or a shadow.

They quickly reached the room that Phil shared with Claire. They never slept alone for safety reasons, just like no one ever went anywhere on their own. They’d learned from the mistakes of others who used to be part of their group. Though, Phil supposed that Claire wouldn’t be sharing with him anymore from now on.

They sat down on the big bed, both leaning against the headboard with their sides so they were still looking at each other. As the habit it seemed to become, Dan’s right hand grasped Phil’s tightly.

There was silence between them for a few minutes and then Phil started to tell Dan his story. He left out a few things of course; the ones he couldn’t even let himself think about nevermind utter out loud. Dan listened without interrupting. He occasionally squeezed Phil’s hand or nodded but otherwise didn’t say anything.

When Phil finished talking, he looked up at Dan. “I…,” _missed you._ He couldn’t even say the words that made his heart hurt, but Dan seemed to have picked up on it anyway because he leant forward and pulled Phil into a hug. He caressed Phil’s hair and Phil couldn’t stop tears from forming in his eyes and then they were soundlessly running down his cheeks. He was clinging onto Dan as if he’d disappear any minute.

“I’m not going anywhere,” Dan said into his hair and pressed a kiss to his forehead.

“I know,” Phil replied, his voice firm, “I wouldn’t let you anyway.”

Dan chuckled at that and then gently nudged Phil’s jaw with his hand so that they were looking at each other. Dan wiped away the tears from Phil’s cheeks and then replaced his hand with soft kisses.

“Were you here this whole time?” Phil asked after a while.

“No,” Dan replied and he seemed to think about his next words before saying them. “After we got separated I tried to get back to our flat but it was basically impossible.”

Phil nodded because he knew well enough that in a zombie infested London you had to take one street at a time and covering the distance it took to get back to their flat would’ve got anyone killed.

“I met some people while I was trying to hide, much like you did,” he chuckled but it was laced with sadness. “We tried to get out of London at some point, but…” he trailed off. “Anyway, we decided to stay in the end.”

“I don’t understand how we never met when we basically were so close to each other this whole time,” Phil said, more to himself than to Dan. The thought that he could’ve had _this_ much earlier made him bite his lip as to not cry again.

“We…,” Dan started then reevaluated his words. “That’s because I’d never been in this area before.”

“What do you mean?” Phil asked, a bit confused.

Dan looked at him with so much sadness in his eyes that Phil’s heart hurt. He knew that it was impossible not to feel sad in the world they were living in but still, an unreasonable part of him wanted Dan to be happy nevertheless. He hated seeing him like this. Much like Dan had before, he buried his hand in Dan’s curly hair and Dan leaned into the touch.

“Gavin and I were on a food run,” Dan said eventually, his voice thin like it was physically hurting him to retell what had happened. “It was like any other day, except it wasn’t,” he said, closing his eyes, “there were zombies everywhere and I barely managed to escape. I couldn’t go back to our hiding place because they’d basically taken over that area and even if not…,” he trailed off but Phil knew why he hadn’t been able to go back anyway. He guessed that Gavin and Dan had been the last ones of the group and going back to an empty place he’d once shared with people that were now dead seemed impossible.

“I was looking for a new hiding spot when I heard someone screaming your name. I mean, I obviously didn’t know it was _you_ , but… I felt like I had to help. I had nothing to lose anyway.”

“You saved my life,” Phil whispered. The hand that wasn’t stroking Dan’s hair was buried in Dan’s sweatshirt and Dan took it and intertwined their fingers once more.

“You saved _me_ ,” he whispered back and then he was kissing him and it felt like coming home despite them being in a dingy hotel, sitting on dirty sheets that needed to be washed desperately, but Phil didn’t care about those things. The only thing he cared about was being in Dan’s arms, with Dan’s lips on his and Dan’s name in his thoughts. He’d never quite realised but for Phil home wasn’t a place, home was a person. And in that moment in that alleyway where they had saved each other, Phil had found home again.

**Author's Note:**

> please let me know what you think
> 
> also, I have a [tumblr](https://tsingadark.tumblr.com)


End file.
